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TIL after the White House was burned during the War of 1812, President James Madison spent the rest of his time as president living and conducting business from The Octagon House, which he rented for about $500

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Oo6pe TIL Bicycle Playing Card Company joined forces with American and British intelligence agencies to create a special deck of cards, specifically created to help allied prisoners of war escape from German POW camps.
D1E0Y TIL of William A. Jackson, a former slave who had served Jefferson Davis. He routinely observed communications between Davis and other Confederate officials. When he fled north in 1861, he gave the Union detailed information about Confederate military deployments, supply issues, and planning.
5VnyR TIL that (Spaghetti) Puttanesca means "in the style of a whore" or may also have originally been named, "I just threw a bunch of shit from the cupboard into a pan.”
V8G8 TIL the battle of Cannae (216BCE) is one of the greatest tactical victories in military history and Rome’s worst defeat. With 50,000 men Carthaginian general Hannibal Barca encircled and destroyed a Roman army of 86,000, killing 75,000 and capturing 10,000. Hannibal suffered only 4,000 casualties.
ekJb TIL that in 2010 King Henry IV of France’s head was found preserved in the attic of a retired tax collector